Response to Aug. 3, 2017 letter to you from UNPRI on Climate Disclosure Review

We respond herein to the United Nations-supported Principles for Responsible Investment Association’s (UNPRI) letter dated August 3, 2017. We are deeply concerned that investors, beneficiaries and the public are being misled on climate change issues related to investments, and that markets are being skewed in ways that favour geopolitical trade wars against Canadian corporate interests and against the Canadian public in general. This issue of ‘climate disclosure’ is a crucial issue of economic sovereignty for Canada and our competitive place in energy geopolitics.

About Friends of Science Society

We are a non-profit society made up of earth, atmospheric, solar scientists, Professional Engineers, economists and public policy experts. We do not represent any industry. Our information is evidence-based.

Climate Risk and Disclosure

Following the release of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) fifth assessment report (AR5) of Sept. 2013, it was evident that for 15 years to the date of publication (2012) there had been no measurable rise in global temperatures (IPCC AR5 Working Group I, Physical Sciences, Chapter 9, Box 9.2. page 769), [1] despite a significant rise in carbon dioxide concentration.

Disturbingly we find that UNPRI signatories like NEI Investments claim that since 2002, they have based their investment and climate risks on IPCC early findings. Throughout UNPRI documents, there is common reference to a goal of maintaining earth’s global temperature rise to a 2°Celsius cap through greenhouse gas emissions reductions and the Paris Accord is cited as the tool by which this will be accomplished. According to Ottawa energy policy consultant, Robert Lyman, achieving the aspirational goal of 80 per cent reduction recommended by the IPCC would mean reducing Canadian emissions to 147 megatonnes CO2 equivalent. That would be comparable to reducing Canada’s per capita emissions and our energy economy to the current levels of Bolivia, Sudan or Iraq.

The UNPRI refer to the report of the Financial Stability Board Task Force on Climate-related Disclosures (TFCD), a group which includes many high-profile investors in renewables (wind/solar). The chair is Mr. Bloomberg. According to a Washington Times report of 2015, ‘green’ billionaires have funded the US Sierra Club for hundreds of millions of dollars to demarket coal and push for renewables and carbon taxes. [2] Indeed, in Canada, since 2011, the US Sierra Club, a minority shareholder in TransAlta, has been agitating for coal phase-out. (See Appendix C)

The TFCD chair Michael Bloomberg is quoted on the TFCD website as saying: “Increasing transparency makes markets more efficient, and economies more stable and resilient.” —Michael R. Bloomberg, Chair

In fact, the experience in Canada is the opposite. Canadian companies, particularly those in the oil sands, have voluntarily complied with GHG reporting in good faith, only to have their reporting used against them in a vicious, global, demarketing program driven by large Environmental Nongovernmental Organizations (ENGOs), that are often funded by large foundations or investors in renewables or who are seeking to establish additional cap and trade systems. (See Oak Foundation screen shots Appendix D). The 2016 CDP report “In the Pipeline” ranks Canadian oil sand majors at the bottom, despite many environmental innovations, Combined-Heat-Power developments and GHG reductions. [3]

Alberta coal-fired power producers also complied with voluntary disclosure; they have been run out of business by an offshore funded campaign of fear about health consequences and costs. In fact, the evidence of numerous peer-reviewed reports show that coal emissions are a minor factor in air quality in Alberta. The Alberta power market is in chaos and NEI Investments and related signatories have influenced the Alberta government to adopt an extremely ambitious renewable energy plan (to adopt some 5,000 MW of wind/solar, replacing coal with 2/3 generation by renewables. This ratio of generation by renewables has not been accomplished anywhere in the world.)

The IPCC AR5 report contains valuable information showing that climate models (models are computer simulations) upon which the UNPRI climate disclosure action is predicated, are falsely representing warming as if it was a result of human-caused greenhouse gas emissions. [4]

Appendix One of this document shows a graph from the IPCC AR5 report and describes how climate simulations/models that remove the human greenhouse gas factor, demonstrate that natural influences most closely parallel the observed temperatures. This means that the IPCC shows human greenhouse gas emissions are NOT the main driver of global warming. The appendix also discusses how solar activity more closely parallels changing climate patterns and over longer time scales.

In no part of the UNPRI letter submitted to you, in their annual report or in the TFCD document, do we find any reference to this material or the fact that there are vast uncertainties about causes and ratios of human vs natural influences on climate change. To the contrary, in Canada, the Koskie Minsky report “Climate Change and the Fiduciary Duties of Pension Fund Trustees in Canada” [5] on climate disclosure, released in of Sept. 2015, Canadian pension fund trustees and managers are told in no uncertain terms “climate change denial is not an option.”

Friends of Science Society issued two reports responding to this position.